


little shards

by fracturedvaels



Series: tumblr fics and writing scraps [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-15
Updated: 2015-06-15
Packaged: 2018-04-04 14:38:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4141542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fracturedvaels/pseuds/fracturedvaels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. An alternate look at Sebastian meeting Hawke and some friends for the first time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	little shards

His lip is split. Bloodied. Bruises under his eye, on the left side of his face. There are cuts on his fingers from where they pushed him onto broken glass (and laughed about it; of course they did, of course).

“We’ll take you back to the Chantry - ” his savior, Hawke? Hawke, he thinks; he’s heard of the man, but never met him. Not before today. “Your mother will be please you are… whole, at least.”

“Hawke,” the blond man to Hawke’s left is tall, lanky. He drums his fingers on his stave nervously, looking at the other mage. “I don’t think he cares, right now.”

No, the man is right. Sebastian doesn’t.

When the bandits took him, they threw all of his stuff in another room. They stripped him of everything, even his smalls, putting him in a dirty tunic and old pants. Sebastian had hoped, hadn’t wanted to believe the crunching noises were this, but… now, he had proof. Amindst pieces of shiny white armor that are covered in dust lay the chunks of his bow.

No, not his bow. His grandfather’s bow, his family’s ancestral weapon. It’s been dashed to bits and pieces with the string snapped and the carefully carved wood splintered.

“Oh,” he says, softly, and he doesn’t think they hear him. He crouches down and picks up a piece. This bow was one of a kind, no other like it, because it was made by his grandfather in his youth. Sebastian had taken care of it since it came to his possession, had repaired it every time it got a ding, reapplied laquer, replaced the string. And now it was…

Now it was in pieces. Like him. Better burnt to ashes, he figured.

Sebastian bit his busted lip. He wouldn’t cry. Not over this, not in front of strangers.

But he felt the first large, warm tears welling up, and he furiously scrubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. Then he rested the back of his wrist against his mouth, and felt more tears, and didn’t bother to brush these away as he stood and turned, took careful, wounded-deer steps past Hawke and his friends.

“Don’t you want your - ” Hawke started, but his blond friend moved to Sebastian’s side quickly.

“No,” Sebastian said, hoping to sound certain, not broken as he was. These men had taken him, tortured him, done unspeakable things to him and his belongings. They intended to end him here in this dusty old ruin, and from how much they’d damaged his belongings, they might as well have.

Sebastian doesn’t flinch or lean away when the blond man takes his arm and makes him slow down. He leans too heavily against him, grateful when the lanky man - and he is lanky, but he’s strong, stronger than Sebastian is right now, anyway - bends slightly, and puts his arms around Sebastian and lifts him. The young princeling is unsteady enough, and he’s grateful; he wraps his arms around the mage’s neck and hides his face against his shoulder.

Even starved, Sebastian must be too heavy for him to be comfortable carrying, but he carries him without complaint. A gesture beyond kindness, truly.

And he doesn’t even know the man’s name.

“Anders,” he hears, and for a moment he thinks he must’ve spoken out loud, but it’s not the blond man who said it. It’s Hawke’s elf companion, with the red ribbon around his wrist.

“We’ll take him to camp,” the man - Anders - says, and that seems to be the end of the discussion, because no one complains.

**Author's Note:**

> find me @ http://princetheirin.tumblr.com/


End file.
